Eight things you might not know about black boxes - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) Eight things you might not know about black boxes With the crashes of AirAsia flight QZ8501 and Malaysia Airlines MH17, along with the disappearance of flight MH370, there is again focus on airline "black boxes". Here are some things you might not know about black boxes: 1. They're not black Black boxes are the same colour as the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco ... kind of. They are a tone of what's known as international orange, which is a set of three colours used in aerospace and engineering to distinguish objects from their surroundings. The Golden Gate Bridge is a darker shade, while the international orange used for black boxes is much brighter. Photo: The tone of international orange used to paint the Golden Gate Bridge is most closely matched by Pantone colour 180. (AFP: Justin Sullivan) 2. A 'black box' comes in two parts The "black box" is made up of two separate pieces of equipment: the flight data recorder (FDR) and a cockpit voice recorder (CVR).

They are compulsory on any commercial flight or corporate jet, and are usually kept in the tail of an aircraft, where they are more likely to survive a crash. FDRs record things like airspeed, altitude, vertical acceleration and fuel flow. Early versions used wire string to encode the data; these days they use solid-state memory boards. Solid-state recorders in large aircraft can track more than 700 parameters. Photo: The black boxes from the Asiana plane that crashed short of the runway at San Francisco airport on July 6, 2013. (Twitter: @NTSB) 3. They were invented by an Australian Dr David Warren's own father was killed in a Bass Strait plane crash in 1934, when David was just nine years old. In the early 1950s, Dr Warren had an idea for a unit that could record flight data and cockpit conversations, to help analysts piece together the events that led to an accident. He wrote a memo for the Aeronautical Research Centre in Melbourne called "A Device for Assisting Investigation into Aircraft Accidents", and in 1956 produced a prototype flight recorder called the "ARL Flight Memory Unit".

His invention did not get much attention until five years later, and the units were eventually manufactured in the UK and US. However, Australia was the first country to make the technology compulsory. 4. Experts don't call them "black boxes" The term "black box" is favoured by the media, but most people in the know don't call them that. There are several theories for the original of the name "black box", ranging from early designs being perfectly dark inside, to a journalist's description of a "wonderful black box", to charring that happens in post-accident fires. From The Conversation : Black boxes are normally referred to by aviation experts as electronic flight data recorders. Their role is to keep detailed track of on-flight information, recording all flight data such as altitude, position and speed as well as all pilot conversations. It is common for many civil airliners to have multiple devices to carry out these tasks so that information can be gathered more easily in the event of a failure. In most instances, they are used to help in the diagnosis of what may have been the likely cause of an accident. External Link: Inside a vintage flight data recorder 5.

Only 2 hours of cockpit conversations are kept Digital recorders have enough storage for 25 hours of flight data but only two hours of cockpit voice recording, which is recorded over itself in a loop. The CVRs track the crew's interactions with each other and air traffic control, but also background noise that can give vital clues to investigators. Earlier magnetic tape versions could only record 30 minutes of cockpit conversations and noise, which was also recorded in a loop. Photo: The magnetic tape flight data recorder from Alaska Airlines Flight 261 was retrieved off the coast of California after the plane crashed in 2000. (AFP: Manny Ceneta) 6. It can take a long time to find one Photo: A US Navy Towed Pinger Locator (TPL) has been sent to help find MH370's black box. (Supplied: US Navy) Black boxes are fitted with an underwater locator beacon that starts emitting a pulse if its sensor touches water. They work to a depth of just over four kilometres, and can "ping" once a second for 30 days before the battery runs out, meaning MH370's black box stopped pinging around April 7, 2014.

After Air France flight 447 crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, it took search teams two years to find and raise the black boxes. They provided valuable information about what actually happened prior to the crash. The US Navy sent a Towed Pinger Locator (pictured above) to help with the search for MH370's flight data recorders. The locator is used for finding emergency relocation pingers on downed Navy and commercial aircraft at a maximum depth of 20,000 feet anywhere in the world. Because flight MH17 crashed over land, finding it should be more straightforward. 7. They're virtually indestructible... FDRs are usually double-wrapped in titanium or stainless steel, and must be able to withstand atrocious conditions . The crucial part that contains the memory boards, the CSMU, is shot out of an air cannon to create an impact of 3,400 Gs and then smashed against a target. It is subjected to a 227kg weight with a pin attached to it, which is dropped onto the unit from a height of three metres.

Researchers try to crush it, destroy it in an hour of 1,100 degree Celsius fire, submerge it in a pressurised salt water tank, and immerse it in jet fuel. External Link: CSMU fire test 8. ... But they're not as powerful as your phone In the aftermath of MH370, experts say it might be time to update methods of collecting flight data. Passengers are able to text, stream and surf the internet but the data recorders on board are not communicating in real time with the rest of the world. However, the bandwidth needed to stream huge amounts of data from large aircraft is not currently feasible. Aviation author Stephen Trimble writes in the Guardian that Boeing has applied for a patent on a system that will transmit a subset of data including the plane's location: There will be costs to mandating such a system, but the benefits are clear. Multi-national search and recovery teams involving a fleet of ships and search aircraft should no longer be necessary. Critical safety data could provide clues of system or structural failures much faster, making the entire air transport system safer.

Australian History - the Bits You Didn't Know About | Lonetester HQ Australian History – the Bits You Didn’t Know About Posted on 22 May 2013 | 1 comment I think I’d be pretty right in saying that as far as Australian history that is taught in schools pretty much covers the convicts, the explorers, and the wars. And while each are fascinating in their own right, I have found other bits of Australian history that also deserve to be known. Now I can’t speak for the current generation, but I know they certainly weren’t in the syllabus when I was at school. So get comfy, grab a coffee, and take a little look into Australia’s history, and discover the bits that you didn’t know about. And at the end, see how many of these fascinating facts you actually already knew about. ====================== The 1800s ====================== 1803 – Australia’s First Newspaper The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser was the first newspaper to be printed in Australia. It ran from 5 March 1803 until 20 October 1842.

It was an official publication of the government of New South Wales, and was authorised by Governor King and printed by George Howe. ====================== The 1830s ====================== 1838 – Pre-paid Postage The Colonial Postmaster-General of New South Wales, James Raymond introduced the world’s first pre-paid postal system, using pre-stamped sheets as envelopes. Who knew pre-paid envelopes started way back then? ====================== The 1850s ====================== 1856 – Refrigerator Now this was a surprise too, not the fact that it was invented, but the fact it was so early. James Harrison, who was born in Dunbartonshire, Scotland in about 1816, was the son of a fisherman. James was apprenticed to a printer at Glasgow where he managed to attend the Evening College and later the Glasgow Mechanics’ Institution, where he specialised in chemistry. Harrison’s greatest achievement and much of his financial failure stemmed from his inventions: he was a pioneer in all kinds of refrigeration. At Geelong in Victoria he designed and built the plant for the first Australian manufacture of ice and began production at Rocky Point, taking out a local patent in 1854.

The Bendigo brewers, Glasgow & Co., soon adopted his principles in a pioneer mechanical refrigerator. In 1856 Harrison went to London where he patented both his process and his apparatus. 1857 – Macadamia Nuts In the 1850’s in Australia’s eastern states, these trees were noticed by a British botanist Walter Hill and by German botanist Ferdinand Von Meuller, who later became the Director of the Botanical Gardens of Brisbane, Queensland. The two men were struck with the majestic beauty of the specimens found growing in the rain forests of Queensland. The genus Macadamia was named after a prominent scientist of that time, Dr John McAdam. 1858 – Australian Rules Football Of course this is an Aussie game, but do you know HOW it came about? Well Aussie Rules footy began its development when Tom Wills wrote a letter and published in a Victorian newspaper in calling for a “foot-ball club, a rifle club or other athletic pursuits” to keep cricketers fit during winter. An experimental match was played by Wills and others at the Richmond Paddock, later known as Yarra Park next to the Melbourne Cricket Ground on 31 July 1858.

So there you go, it started as an extra sport to keep cricketers fit. ====================== The 1880s ====================== 1889 – Electric Drill I think who is reading this has either used or got someone they know to use an electric drill. They are just SO handy! On 20 August 1889 Arthur James Arnot patented the world’s first electric drill while working for the Union Electric Company in Melbourne. He designed it primarily to drill rock and to dig coal. ====================== The 1900s ====================== 1901 – the Australian Flag becomes Australia’s flag The flag’s original design (with a six-pointed Commonwealth Star) was chosen in 1901 from entries in a worldwide competition held following Federation, and was first flown in Melbourne on 3 September 1901 and this date has been proclaimed as Australian National Flag Day [we have a National Flag Day, who knew??]. Anyway a slightly different design was approved by King Edward VII in 1902.

And over the next few years, the exact specifications of the flag were changed several times both intentionally and as a result of confusion, but the current ones were formally gazetted in 1934, and in 1954 the flag became recognised by the Flags Act 1953, as the “Australian National Flag”. 1902 – Notepad Ugh, we’d all be lost without the notepad, so to Mr Birchall who decided to change history … thankyou! For 500 years, paper had been supplied in loose sheets. Launceston stationer J.A. Birchall decided that it would be a good idea to cut the sheets in half, back them with cardboard and glue them together at the top. 1906 – Feature Film The world’s first feature length film, The Story of the Kelly Gang, was a little over an hour long. And with it began a new era. 1906 – Surf Life-Saving Reel The first surf life-saving reel in the world was demonstrated at Bondi Beach on 23 December 1906 by its designer, Bondi surfer Lester Ormsby.

====================== The 1910s ====================== 1912 – Self-Propelled Rotary Hoe At the age of 16 Cliff Howard of Gilgandra invented a machine with rotating hoe blades on an axle that simultaneously hoed the ground and puled the machine forward. ====================== The 1920s ====================== 1922 – Vegemite In 1919, prior to the introduction of Vegemite, the Sanitarium Health Food Company in New Zealand began manufacturing and shipping to Australia a version of Vegemite’s biggest competitor, Marmite. Vegemite was invented in 1922 by food technologist Cyril P. Callister when there was disruption of imports of Marmite after World War I. Vegemite was registered as a trademark in Australia that same year, and the name was chosen by competition. Vegemite first appeared on the market in 1923 but faced growing competition from Marmite, from 1928 to 1935 the product was renamed as “Parwill”. Their renaming didn’t work, and the name was changed back to Vegemite.

1926 – Electronic Pacemaker The artificial pacemaker is a wonder of modern science. This small, implantable device that regulates a human heart beat through electrical impulses has saved millions of lives. The development of this vital medical device owes much to the advances in electronics and communications brought about by modern society. In 1926, Australian doctors Mark C. Lidwell and Edgar H. Booth invented the first pacemaker. It was a portable device that consisting of two poles, one of which included a needle that would be plunged into a cardiac chamber. It was very crude, but it succeeded in reviving a stillborn baby at a Sydney hospital in 1928. ====================== The 1930s ====================== 1930 – Clapperboard You know the wooden black and white board that is used right before “Action” is called in a movie – well that’s a clapperboard, and it was used to synchronise sound and film. And the invention of this is attributed to Frank Thring Snr of Efftee Studios in Melbourne.

1934 – Ute The car body style, known as the ‘ute’, at least in Australia and New Zealand, combines a two-door “coupe” cabin with an integral cargo bed behind the cabin—using a light-duty passenger vehicle-derived platform. It was designed by Lewis Brandt at the Ford Motor Company in Geelong, Victoria, and the first ute rolled off the Ford production lines in 1934. Now the really cool bit about this history is that the idea came from a Geelong farmer’s wife who wrote to Ford in 1933 advising the need for a new sort of vehicle to take her ‘to church on Sundays and pigs to market on Mondays. ====================== The 1940s ====================== 1940 – Zinc Cream Zinc cream, you know that white stuff you see cricketers have smeared on the noses in summer was developed back in 1940. Made from zinc oxide this was developed by the Fauldings pharmaceutical company. 1943 – Splayd While I hadn’t seen splayd spelt that way, but rather splade, but I am thankful to the inventor, as they are most useful.

This is the combination of a knife, fork and spoon, and was invented by William McArthur after seeing ladies struggle to eat at barbecues with standard cutlery from plates on their laps. ====================== The 1950s ====================== 1953 – Solar hot water The invention of Solar hot water dated back to 1953 when it was developed by a team at the CSIRO led by Roger N. Morse. We have enough sun here in Australia, so it makes sense to use it to advantage. 1958 – Black box flight recorder The ‘black box’ voice and instrument data recorder was invented by Dr David Warren in Melbourne. And while I’m no expert on these boxes, I am aware that having information stored on them has proved useful to many in determining the happenings of plane crashes and other disasters that have them installed. ====================== The 1960s ====================== 1964 – Tim Tams Tims Tams are one of Australia’s icons, well I think so anyway!

Now Ian Norris, who was the director of food technology at Arnott’s took a world trip in 1958 looking for inspiration for new products, and while in Britain he found the Penguin biscuit and decided to “make a better one”. And make it he did, and Tim Tams went on to the market in 1964. And as a tidbit, Tim Tams were named by Ross Arnott who attended the 1958 Kentucky Derby and decided that the name of the winning horse Tim Tam was perfect for a planned new line of biscuits. 1965 – Wine cask Invented by Thomas Angove of Renmark, South Australia, the wine cask is a cardboard box housing a plastic container which collapses as the wine is drawn off, thus preventing contact with the air. Angroves’ original design with a resealable spout was replaced with a tap by the Penfolds wine company in 1972. Both Angove and Penfolds are well-known names in the wine industry. ====================== The 1970s ====================== The self-sharpening knife was developed by Wiltshire, and hasn’t it been so useful.

😉 ====================== The 1980s ====================== 1980 – Dual flush toilet Bruce Thompson, working for Caroma in Australia, developed the Duoset cistern, with two buttons, and two flush volumes as a water-saving measure, now responsible for savings in excess of 32,000 litres of water per household per year. Great idea isn’t it! 1984 – Baby Safety Capsule In 1984 for the first time babies had a bassinette with an air bubble in the base and a harness that distributed forces across the bassinette protecting the baby. New South Wales public hospitals now refuse to allow parents take a baby home by car without one. 1984 – Advance Australia Fair “Advance Australia Fair” is the official national anthem of Australia. It was created by the Scottish-born composer Peter Dodds McCormick, and the song was first performed in 1878 but did not gain its status as the official anthem until 1984. Until then the song was sung in Australia as a patriotic song.

In order for the song to become the anthem it had to face a vote against the Royal Anthem (“God Save the Queen”), “Waltzing Matilda” (the “unofficial anthem”) and “Song of Australia”. And the earliest known sound recording of “Advance Australia Fair” appears in The Landing of the Australian Troops in Egypt (circa 1916), a short commercial recording dramatising the arrival of Australian troops in Egypt en route to Gallipoli. 1988 – Polymer banknote The development of the polymer bank note was made by CSIRO scientists led by Dr. David Solomon. Securency Pty Ltd, a joint venture between the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and UCB, brought the note into full production, with the main advantages are high counterfeiting resistance and longer circulation lifetimes. ====================== The 1990s ====================== 1992 – Wi-Fi A method developed by CSIRO researchers used to “unsmear” radio waves that echo off indoor surfaces was patented. This method has caused WiFi to be attributed as an Australian invention, although the Wi-Fi trademark, under which most products are sold, is under the ownership of the Wi-Fi Alliance based in Austin, Texas.

===================================================== So there you go, if you’re made it this far you now know a whole heap more about Australia’s history. And apart from that, I also thank you for your commitment in reading to the end. This post was never meant to be this long, but once I started looking I found so much interesting stuff it simply grew. I mean who knew that it was a Tassie stationer who developed the notepad, or that Tim Tams were named after a racehorse. While it’s not lifechanging stuff (ok maybe the notepads are), it’s simply cool though, and I wanted to share these bits with you. Share this: Black Box ( FDR & CVR ) Black Box ( FDR & CVR ) الثلاثاء، 8 يناير، 2013 The End of the Black Box: There’s a Better Way to Capture Plane Crash Data The black boxes were sitting on the ocean floor in what would have been plain sight, if there were any light at a depth of 12,800 feet. They were guarded by silent corpses, the passengers and crew of an Airbus A330 that plummeted to the bottom of the Atlantic in June 2009.

For nearly two years, the boxes—not black, actually, but bright orange—had lain amid some of the most rugged undersea terrain in the world, 11,500-foot mountains rising from the ocean floor, covered with landslides and steep scarps. Until the days in May when an advanced robotic submersible, the Remora 6000, brought the two black boxes from Air France flight 447 to the surface, they were among the world’s most sought-after artifacts, the keys to understanding why a state-of-the-art widebody jet fell out of the sky on a routine flight from Rio de Janeiro to Paris, killing all 228 aboard. Since no one knew the exact coordinates of the crash, the searchers had to extrapolate their grid from the plane’s last known location. It took a team led by the king of undersea searchers, Dave Gallo of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, to find the wreckage; Phoenix International, a deepwater recovery company, finally brought the recorders home. Why did it take so long?

“You can find a needle in a haystack,” Gallo says, “but you have to find the haystack first.” French accident investigators removed the memory cards, carefully dried them, plugged in the right cables, and soon announced that the boxes had preserved nearly all the data they had captured—two hours of audio recorded from the cockpit and a complete record of thousands of measurements taken between takeoff and the moment the Airbus crashed. It was regarded, rightly, as a technological triumph. Although voice and data recorders are built to withstand the most extreme conditions of shock, fire, and pressure—they get fired from an air cannon as part of the testing regimen—they are not designed to preserve data for so long at such depths. The black boxes, built by Honeywell, had greatly exceeded their specifications. But this elaborate and expensive undersea search could have been avoided; the technology has long existed that could make the recorders obsolete.

As the BEA, the French agency that investigates air accidents, struggled to explain the crash in two inconclusive interim reports in 2009, the question was already being asked: If real-time stock quotes can be transmitted to anyone with a smartphone, why does the vital work of investigating an airplane crash still depend on reading physical memory chips that must be rescued from the wreckage? The tragedy of Air France 447 might have been on the minds of executives from Bombardier, the Canadian aircraft manufacturer, when they announced in 2010 that their new CSeries narrow-body jets, scheduled to come to market in 2013, would be the first commercial airliners built with the capability to transmit telemetry data instead of merely recording it. The idea—to stream black box data in real time, either directly to a ground station or by satellite relay—isn’t new, even though there remains no consensus on whether to call it an uplink, which is conceptually accurate, or a downlink, which expresses the physical relationship of an airplane to the ground.

Bombardier is advertising the innovation not as a way to improve crash investigation—survivability of data after a crash isn’t something airplane manufacturers like to boast about—but as a way to give airlines a central database for routine information on airplane operations and mechanical performance. At a minimum, the data could be stored securely as a backup to black boxes in the event of an accident. One company, Calgary-based FLYHT AeroMechanical Services, already provides this service as an aftermarket retrofit; so far, smaller carriers and charters have been the main customers. But until the Air France crash, streaming data was mostly considered a solution in search of a problem. Black boxes were almost always found: The last US or European accident from which onboard data recorders were not recovered was the World Trade Center attacks, in which both planes were essentially vaporized. When planes crash into the ocean, locator beacons on the black boxes send out an ultrasonic ping designed to be heard through the water at distances of up to several miles.

“Approach and landing accidents are half the crashes in a given year,” says Bill Voss, president and CEO of the Flight Safety Foundation, “and then you just walk over and pick it up.” Even in the more difficult cases, black boxes usually survive. Data was retrieved from the recorders aboard the hijacked United Airlines flight 93, which nosed into a Pennsylvania field on 9/11 at an estimated speed of over 550 miles an hour, gouging a crater 8 feet deep. Invented in the 1950s after a spate of accidents involving the de Havilland Comet, the first commercial jet, flight data recorders have become standard equipment on all but the smallest aircraft. The earliest models recorded data with a moving stylus on a roll of foil; as recently as 1994, when USAir flight 427 rolled over and crashed on approach to Pittsburgh, the flight data recorder on the Boeing 737 measured only 13 parameters, such as altitude, airspeed, heading, pitch and roll, and whether the pilots were pulling or pushing on the control column.

It did not, for instance, record the position of the rudder or of the rudder pedals in the cockpit—information that turned out to be crucial in the investigation, which took five years before probable cause was ascribed to a malfunction in the rudder’s hydraulic control valve. As a result, the latest black boxes are far more sophisticated. The FAA requires most planes flying today to monitor only 88 parameters, generally once or twice per second, but data recorders on modern commercial jetliners may track as many as 3,000 data points, including the status of every system on the aircraft, the positions of cockpit controls, and pressure and temperature readings from fuel tanks and hydraulic systems. Sensors monitor every point in the engines from intake to exhaust. And starting next year, new rules will require that critical measurements such as the positions of flaps, ailerons, and rudders get sampled eight times per second. Some airlines use this data for routine purposes like scheduling engine maintenance, but you never know what might turn out to be important in a crash investigation. It is, of course, far more information than is available to pilots in the cockpit—or that they could possibly absorb during a crisis.

When something goes wrong at 550 miles an hour, it can go wrong very quickly. مرسلة بواسطة The inventive Australian mind Telpahane - The forerunner of the television. It was invented by Henry Sutton in Ballarat. 1877 Mechanical clippers -Shearing is a backbreaking job but it was even more back breaking when sheep were sheared using scissors. Frederick York Wolseley succeeded in developing a practical hand piece with a comb and reciprocating cutter driven by power transmitted from a stationary engine. The invention greatly increased the profitability of the wool industry. 1879 Ship refrigeration - Credited with the manufacture of the first artificial ice, Eugene Nicolle and Thomas Sutcliffe Mort developed shipboard refrigeration that resulted in the export of meat from Australia to Great Britain. 1889 Electric Drill - Arthur James Arnot patented the world's first electric drill on 20 August 1889 while he was an employee of the Union Electric Company in Melbourne. He designed it primarily to drill rock and to dig coal. 1894 First powered flight - Perhaps inspired by the boomerang, Lawrence Hargrave discovered that curved surfaces lift more than flat ones.

He subsequently built the world's first box-kite, hitched four together, added an engine and flew five metres. Hargrave corresponded freely with other aviation pioneers, including the Wright Brothers, but unlike the Americans who monopolised their ideas, Hargrave never patented his. Because it promised public access, Hargrave left all his research to the Munich Museum. Had Hargrave gained local support to further develop his ideas and not been so generous in sharing his ideas with other aviation pioneers, he probably would have been the first person in the world to achieve sustained and controlled powered flight. 1897 Differential gears - David Shearer of South Australia built a steam car with a differential inside left rear wheel hub. 1902 Notepad -For 500 years, paper had been supplied in loose sheets. J A Birchall decided that it would be a good idea to cut the sheets into half, back them with cardboard and glue them together at the top. 1903 Froth flotation process- The process of separating minerals from rock by flotation was developed by Charles Potter and Guillaume Delprat of New South Wales.

1906 Feature film - The world's first feature length film, The Story of the Kelly Gang, was a little over an hour long. 1906 Surf life-saving reel - The first surf life-saving reel in the world was demonstrated at Bondi Beach on 23 December 1906 by its designer Lester Ormsby. 1910 Humespun process -The Humespun process was developed by Walter Hume of Humes Ltd for making concrete pipes of high strength and low permeability. The process revolutionised pipe manufacture in 1910 and has since been used around the world. 1912 The tank - A South Australian named Lance de Mole submitted a proposal, to the British War Office, for a 'chain-rail vehicle which could be easily steered and carry heavy loads over rough ground and trenches'. 1913 Automatic totalisator -The world's first automatic totalisator for calculating horse-racing bets was made by Sir George Julius. 1917 Aspro - A pain reliever based on aspirin was developed in Melbourne by George Nicholas. By 1940 it had become the world's most widely used headache and pain treatment.

1922 Vegemite - One of the world's richest sources of vitamin B, vegemite was invented by Dr. Cyril P. Callister. It is made by the autolysis of expired brewer's yeast: a process where the yeast's own enzymes break it down. 1924 Car radio - The first car radio was fitted to an Australian car built by Kellys Motors in New South Wales. 1927 Speedo -In 1927 Speedo launched the revolutionary 'racer-back' style, which reduced fabric drag. In 1955, Speedo introduced the use of nylon for their racing swimwear. At the 1968, 1972 and 1976 Olympics, more than 70 per cent of all swimming medals were won by competitors wearing Speedo. 1928 Flying Doctor Service - Reverend John Flynn founded the world's first Aerial Medical Service in 1928. 1930s - Nuclear Fusion - In the early 20th century, Mark Oliphant worked on the artificial disintegration of the atomic nucleus and positive ions, and designed complex particle accelerators.

He discovered helium 3 and tritium, and also discovered that heavy hydrogen nuclei could be made to react with each other. This fusion reaction formed the basis of a hydrogen bomb. 1934 Ute- The utility vehicle, with a front like a car and a rear like a truck was designed by Lewis Brandt at the Ford Motor Company in Geelong, Victoria. 1940 Zinc Cream - This white sun block made from zinc oxide was developed by the Fauldings pharmaceutical company. 1942 Transverse folding stroller - Designed by Harold Cornish, the sturdy, lightweight design of his Stoway Strollers made life easier for many parents using public transport as it could be folded and placed under a tram seat. 1943 Splayd – The combination of knife, fork and spoon was invented by William McArthur after seeing ladies struggle to eat at barbecues with standard cutlery from plates on their laps 1944 Antibiotic penicillin- Produced by Howard Florey with help from an Englishman named Ernst Chain. 1945 The Hills Hoist - A rotary clothes line with a winding mechanism allowing the frame to be lowered and raised with ease. Invented by Lance Hill.

1952 Victor mower - by Mervyn Victor Richardson, the two-stroke petrol lawn mower with rotary blades revolutionised mowing world wide. 1950s Lagerphone- The lagerphone is a musical instrument made by nailing beer caps onto a stick. It is not known who invented it, but in the 50s it was popularised by the Heathcote Bushwackers as an alternative to the American wobbleboard. 1950s Distance Measuring Equipment - Every airliner in the world uses a piece of navigation equipment called DME, or Distance Measuring Equipment. 1952 Atomic absorption spectrophotometer -Atomic absorption spectrophotometer is a complex analytical instrument incorporating micro-computer electronics and precision optics and mechanics, used in chemical analysis to determine low concentrations of metals in a wide variety of substances. It was first developed by Sir Alan Walsh of the CSIRO. 1953 Solar hot water - Developed by R N Morse at the CSIRO . 1957 Flame ionisation detector -The flame ionisation detector is one of the most accurate instruments ever developed for the detection of emissions. It was invented by Ian McWilliam.

The instrument, which can measure one part in 10 million, has been used in chemical analysis in the petrochemical industry, medical and biochemical research, and in the monitoring of the environment. 1957 Trousers with a permeant crease - The process for producing permanently creased fabric was invented by Dr Arthur Farnworth of the CSIRO. 1958 Black box flight recorder - The 'black box' voice and instrument data recorder was invented by Dr David Warren in Melbourne. 1960 Plastic spectacle lenses - The world's first plastic spectacle lenses, 60 per cent lighter than glass lenses, were designed by Scientific Optical Laboratories. 1961 Ultrasound - David Robinson and George Kossoff's work at the Australian Department of Health, resulted in the first commercially practical water path ultrasonic scanner in 1961. 1965 Inflatable escape slide - The inflatable aircraft escape slide which doubles as a raft was invented by Jack Grant of Qantas. 1965 Wine cask -Invented by Thomas Angrove, the wine cask is a cardboard box housing a plastic container which collapses as the wine is drawn off, thus preventing contact with air.

1970 Variable rack and pinion steering - The variable ratio rack and pinion steering in motor vehicles was invented by Australian engineer, Arthur Bishop. 1970 Staysharp knife- The self-sharpening knife was developed by Wiltshire. 1972 Orbital internal combustion engine - The orbital combustion process engine was invented by engineer Ralph Sarich. The engine uses a single triangular-shaped piston to create five combustion chambers as it orbits inside a single cylinder. It is 40 per cent lighter, 60 per cent smaller and 35 per cent more efficient than standard car engines. Today, it is used in two-stroke engines, boat engines, motorbikes, lawn mowers and some small cars 1972- Instream analysis - To speed-up analysis of metals during the recovery process, which used to take up to 24 hours, Amdel Limited developed an on-the-spot analysis equipment called the In-Stream Analysis System, for the processing of copper, zinc, lead and platinum - and the washing of coal. This computerised system allowed continuous analysis of key metals and meant greater productivity for the mineral industry worldwide.

1972 Powerboard – The powerboard allows multiple electrical devices to be powered where only a single wall socket is available. It was invented by Frank Bannigan at Kambrook. 1974 Super Sopper – During the Australian summer, no many days of cricket are lost to rain but for Gordon Withnall, even one minute lost was one minute too many. Consequently, he invented the Super Sopper, a giant rolling sponge used to quickly soak up water from sporting grounds so that play could continue. 1978 Plastic injection moulding software -Engineers at Moldflow Pty Ltd revolutionised the plastic injection process with a new computer aided engineering software, that simulated the injection moulding process and offered a design strategy to evaluate, refine and optimise successive simulations. The technique has been used widely in the automotive, whitegoods, computer, packaging, communications, aeronautical and photographic industries. 1979 Race-cam - Race Cam was developed by Geoff Healey, an engineer with Australian Television Network Seven in Sydney.

The tiny lightweight camera is used in sports broadcasts and provides viewers with spectacular views of events such as motor racing, which are impossible with conventional cameras 1979 Bionic ear - The cochlear implant was invented by Professor Graeme Clark of the University of Melbourne. 1982 The dual flush toilet - As dunnies have a celebrated status in Australia, it is apt that Australia has taken a central role in their evolution. In 1982, the dual flush toilet was responsible for savings in excess of 32000 litres of water per household a year. Pretty important in the world's dries inhabited continent. 1980 Wave-piercing catamarans - The high speed catamarans were developed by Phillip Hercus and Robert Clifford of Incat in Tasmania. 1983 Winged Keel - Ben Lexen designed a winged keel that helped Australia II end the American's 132 ownership of the America's cup. The keel gave the yacht better steering and manoeuvrability in heavy winds.

1984 Frozen embryo baby- The world's first frozen embryo baby was born in Melbourne on 28th March 1984 1984 Baby Safety Capsule - Babies in a car crash used to bounce around like a soccer ball. In 1984, for the first time babies had a harness for their safe transportation in cars. 1986 Gene shears - The discovery of gene shears was made by CSIRO scientists, Wayne Gerlach and Jim Haseloff. 1988 Plastic polymer bank notes -Traditionally, paper money has been made out of a kind of cloth that is neither very durable and relatively easy to counterfeit. In 1988, CSIRO scientists led by Dr. David Solomon. Securency Pty Ltd, a joint venture between the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and UCB, brought the note into full production and polymer bank notes. The chief advantages are high counterfeiting resistance and longer circulation lifetimes. 1992 Multi-focal contact lens- The world's first multi-focal contact lens was invented by optical research scientist, Stephen Newman in Queensland.

1992 Supersonic combustion - The University of Queensland demonstrated the world's first supersonic combustion in an atmospheric flight test at Woomera on July 30, 2002. The craft reached speeds of more than Mach 8, or 8 times the speed of sound. 1992 Spray on skin – Research has found that major scarring of burns victims could be reduced if replacement skin could be provided within 10 days of the burn. Unfortunately, traditional skin culturing techniques took around 21 days to produce enough cells to cover major wounds. Spray on skin is a skin culturing treatment developed by scientist Marie Stoner and plastic surgeon Dr Fiona Wood that reduced the culturing period to five days. 1993 Scramjet - The University of Queensland reported for the first time the development of a scramjet that achieved more thrust than drag. 1993 Underwater pc - The world's first underwater computer with a five-button hand-held keypad was developed by Bruce Macdonald at the Australian Institute of Marine Science. 1995 EXELGRAM - The world's most sophisticated optical anti-counterfeiting technology was developed by the CSIRO.

1995 - Jindalee Radar System - The United States of America spent $11 billion developing an aeroplane that could not be detected by radar. Scientists at the CSIRO then concluded that if the plane could not be detected, perhaps the turbulance it makes passing through air could be. $1.5 million later, the Jindalee Radar system had transformed the stealth bomber into nothing more than an unusual looking aircraft. 1996 - Hi-Speed Wi-Fi - During the 1990s, around 22 of the world’s computer firms were researching wi-fi as a way of connecting mobile phones and laptops to a wireless network. Wi-fi technology existed, but it was too slow to connect to the Internet. The CSIRO decided it could make use of the Fast Fourier Transform Chip, invented by Australian Dr John O’ Sullivan in the 1980s. 2002 - Hyshot Scramjet Engine - One day, it is theorised that scramjets will allow people to fly from Sydney to London in less than an hour.

Presently, no planes fitted with scram jet engines exist, but in 2002, the University of Queensland staged the first successful test of a very high speed air-breathing jet engine and thus showed the scramjets are possible. In June 2007, it was successfully used to boost a test vehicle to hypersonic speeds. Science and Technology between 1935-1960 timeline | Timetoast timelines Feb 28th, 1935 Nylon fabric invented Nylon is a generic designation for a family ofsynthetic polymers known generically as aliphatic polyamides, first produced on February 28, 1935, by Wallace Carothers atDuPont's research facility at the DuPont Experimental Station. It is known more famously as women's stockings ("nylons"; 1940) after being introduced as a fabric at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Jan 1st, 1936 Bell Labs invents the voice recognition machine. AT&T's Bell Labs produced the first electronic speech synthesizer called the Voder (Dudley, Riesz and Watkins).

This machine was demonstrated in the 1939 World Fairs by experts that used a keyboard and foot pedals to play the machine and emit speech. Feb 5th, 1936 Charlie Chaplin in Film Modern Times In 1936 Charlie Chaplin starred as a factory worker in the movie Modern Times. This movie is not only a reflection of the mechanization of the arts, but also an attack to the process of machinery. Although at times heavily ideological and exaggerated to please audiences, Modern Times represented a mechanized attempt at understanding machine technology. The inevitable progress of science and technology let people’s voice can be heard through impersonal contact. Apr 1st, 1937 The first jet engine is built. Hans von Ohain is considered the designer of the first operational turbojet engine. Frank Whittle was the first to register a patent for the turbojet engine in 1930. Hans von Ohain was granted a patent for his turbojet engine in 1936. However, Hans von Ohain's jet was the first to fly in 1939.

This engine, which had a single-stage centrifugal compressor coupled to a single-stage turbine, was successfully bench tested in April 1937. Frank Whittle's jet first flew in in 1941. Oct 18th, 1937 Chester F. Carlson invents the photocopier. Chester Carlson, the inventor of photocopying, was originally a patent attorney, as well as a part-time researcher and inventor. His job at the patent office in New York required him to make a large number of copies of important papers. Carlson, who was arthritic, found this to be a painful and tedious process. This motivated him to conduct experiments with photoconductivity. Carlson used his kitchen for his "electrophotography" experiments, and, in 1937, he applied for a patent for the process. Jan 1st, 1938 The first working turboprop engine. A turboprop engine is a jet engine attached to a propellor. The turbine at the back is turned by the hot gases, and this turns a shaft that drives the propellor. Some small airliners and transport aircraft are powered by turboprops.

Hungarian, Gyorgy Jendrassik who worked for the Ganz wagon works in Budapest designed the very first working turboprop engine in 1938. Jan 1st, 1938 The ballpoint pen invented by Ladislo Biro. A Hungarian journalist named Laszlo Biro invented the first ballpoint pen in 1938. Biro had noticed that the type of ink used in newspaper printing dried quickly, leaving the paper dry and smudge-free. He decided to create a pen using the same type of ink. Jan 1st, 1938 Volkswagen Beetle first introduced The Volkswagen Beetle, is an economy car produced by the German auto maker Volkswagen (VW) from 1938 until 2003. The car was conceived by Adolf Hitler when he was leader of Nazi Germany and wanted a cheap, simple car; he contracted Porsche in 1934 to design and build it to his exacting standards. Apr 1st, 1938 Nescafe or freeze-dried coffee invented. The new product was named NESCAFÉ – a combination of Nestlé and café.

NESCAFÉ was first introduced in Switzerland, on April 1st, 1938. For the first half of the next decade, however, World War II hindered its success in Europe. NESCAFÉ was soon exported to France, Great Britain and the USA. American forces played a key role in re-launching NESCAFÉ in Europe by virtue of the fact that it was included in their food rations. Its popularity grew rapidly through the rest of the decade. Apr 6th, 1938 Roy J. Plunkett invented tetrafluoroethylene polymers or Teflon. PTFE or polytetrafluoroethylene was discovered on April 6, 1938 by Dr. Roy Plunkett at the DuPont research laboratories (Jackson Laboratory in New Jersey). Plunkett was working with gases related to Freon® refrigerants when upon checking a frozen, compressed sample of tetrafluoroethylene, he and his associates discovered that the sample had polymerized spontaneously into a white, waxy solid to form polytetrafluoroethylene or PTFE.

Oct 30th, 1938 War of the Worlds Radio Broadcast causes panic The War of the Worlds is an episode of the American radio drama anthology series The Mercury Theatre on the Air. It was performed as a Halloween episode of the series on October 30, 1938, and aired over the Columbia Broadcasting System radio network. Directed and narrated by actor and future filmmaker Orson Welles, the episode was an adaptation of H. G. Wells's novel The War of the Worlds (1898). Nov 16th, 1938 LSD was synthesized by Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann of Sandoz Laboratories. Lysergic acid diethylamide, abbreviated LSD or LSD-25, also known as lysergide (INN) and colloquially as acid, is a semisynthetic psychedelic drug of the ergoline family, well known for its psychological effects which can include altered thinking processes, closed and open eye visuals, synesthesia, an altered sense of time and spiritual experiences, as well as for its key role in 1960s counterculture.

Jan 1st, 1939 Gone with the wind first technicolor matte painting Technicolor is a process that shoots film in color it became known and celebrated for its saturated levels of color, which were new during this time period. A matte painting is a painted representation of a landscape, set, or distant location that allows filmmakers to create the illusion of an environment that is nonexistent in real life or would otherwise be too expensive or impossible to build or visit. Aug 15th, 1939 Wizard of Oz Premier Notable for its use of Technicolor, fantasy storytelling, musical score, and unusual characters, over the years it has become one of the best known of all films and part of American popular culture. It also featured what may be the most elaborate use of character makeups and special effects in a film up to that time. Sep 1st, 1939 World War II and Einstein On the eve of World War II, he endorsed a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt alerting him to the potential developing of "extremely powerful bombs of a new type" and recommending that the U.S. begin similar research. This eventually led to what would become the Manhattan Project.

Einstein was in support of defending the Allied forces, but largely denounced using the new discovery of nuclear fission as a weapon. Later, with the British philosopher Bertrand Russell, Einstein signed the Russ Sep 14th, 1939 Helicoptor Invented Helicopters were developed and built during the first half-century of flight, with the Focke-Wulf Fw 61 being the first operational helicopter in 1936. Some helicopters reached limited production, but it was not until 1942 that a helicopter designed by Igor Sikorsky reached full-scale production, with 131 aircraft built. Jan 1st, 1940 Brecht writes essay "On Experimental Theatre" This combines theatre within science by incorporating naturalism and expressionism. His staging effects made audiences think scientifically while entertaining them. Jan 1st, 1941 Aerosol spray cans invented by American inventors, Lyle David Goodloe and W.N. Sullivan. It was not until 1941 that the aerosol spray can was first put to good use by Americans Lyle Goodhue and William Sullivan, who are credited as the inventors of the modern spray can.

Their design of a refillable spray can dubbed the "bug bomb", is the ancestor of many popular commercial spray products. Feb 20th, 1941 Jeep Invented The original Jeep vehicle that first appeared as the prototype Bantam BRC became the primary light 4-wheel-drive vehicle of the United States Army and Allies during World War II, as well as the postwar period. Dec 2nd, 1942 Enrico Fermi invents the neutronic reactor. On this day, Enrico Fermi, the Italian-born Nobel Prize-winning physicist, directs and controls the first nuclear chain reaction in his laboratory beneath the bleachers of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago, ushering in the nuclear age. Jan 1st, 1943 The kidney dialysis machine invented by Willem Kolff. Dr. Willem Kolff, a Dutch physician, constructed the first working dialyzer in 1943 during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. Due to the scarcity of available resources, Kolff had to improvise and build the initial machine using sausage casings, beverage cans, a washing machine, and various other items that were available at the time.

Sep 10th, 1943 Emile Gagnan and Jacques Cousteau invent the aqualung. Feb 8th, 1945 First Computer Built The first electronic digital computers were developed between 1940 and 1945. Originally they were the size of a large room, consuming as much power as several hundred modern personal computers (PCs). In this era mechanical analog computers were used for military applications. Jul 16th, 1945 The Atomic Bomb Invented At 5:29:45 (Mountain War Time) on July 16, 1945, in a white blaze that stretched from the basin of the Jemez Mountains in northern New Mexico to the still-dark skies, "The Gadget" ushered in the Atomic Age. The light of the explosion then turned orange as the atomic fireball began shooting upwards at 360 feet per second, reddening and pulsing as it cooled. Jan 1st, 1946 The microwave oven invented by Percy Spencer. In 1946, the engineer Dr.

Percy LeBaron Spencer, who worked for the Raytheon Corporation, was working on magnetrons. One day at work, he had a candy bar in his pocket, and found that it had melted. He realized that the microwaves he was working with had caused it to melt. After experimenting, he realized that microwaves would cook foods quickly - even faster than conventional ovens that cook with heat. Jan 1st, 1947 Polaroid Camera Invented he invention of modern instant cameras is generally credited to American scientist Edwin Land, who unveiled the first commercial instant camera, the Land Camera, in 1948, a year after unveiling instant film in New York City. Jun 17th, 1947 Mobile phones first invented. In 1947 AT&T commercialized Mobile Telephone Service. From its start in St. Louis in 1946, AT&T then introduced Mobile Telephone Service to one hundred towns and highway corridors by 1948. Mobile Telephone Service was a rarity with only 5,000 customers placing about 30 000 calls each week.

Calls were set up manually by an operator and the user had to depress a button on the handset to talk and release the button to listen. The call subscriber equipment weighed about 80 lbs. Sep 10th, 1947 British/Hungarian scientist, Dennis Gabor, developed the theory of holography. The holographic principle is a property of quantum gravity and string theories that states that the description of a volume of space can be thought of as encoded on a boundary to the region—preferably a light-like boundary like a gravitational horizon. Jan 1st, 1948 Velcro Invented Velcro is a company that produces the first commercially marketed fabric hook-and-loop fastener, invented in 1948 by the Swiss electrical engineer George de Mestral. De Mestral patented Velcro in 1955, subsequently refining and developing its practical manufacture until its commercial introduction in the late 1950s. Velcro held together a human heart during the first artificial heart surgery, and it is used in nuclear power plants and army tanks to hold flashlights to walls. Jan 1st, 1948 Robert Hope-Jones invented the Wurlitzer jukebox.

The Wurlitzer was the iconic jukebox of the Big Band era, to the extent that Wurlitzer came in some places to be a generic name for any jukebox. Apr 14th, 1948 Ralph Alpher and the Big Bang Theory. The mathematical genius, Ralph Alpher, explained the expansion of the universe from an initial ultra-dense state would produce all elementary particles needed to assemble hydrogen and helium in the proportions seen in the universe today in just a few minutes. This was an important result because hydrogen and helium make up 99.99% of the matter in today’s universe. This time the world took notice and on April 14, 1948 the Washington Post carried the headline “World Began in 5 Minutes." Jan 1st, 1949 Artificial Heart. In 1949, a precursor to the modern artificial heart pump was built by doctors William Sewell and William Glenn. Through 1958 inventions such as the heart-lung machine and different implementations of pumps contribute to artificical heart research. Jan 1st, 1950 The internal pacemaker invented by Wilson Greatbatch.

While experimenting with radio frequency heating to restore body temperature, Hopps made an unexpected discovery: if a heart stopped beating due to cooling, it could be started again by artificial stimulation using mechanical or electric means. Jan 1st, 1950 Movie attendance drops as television grows. Effects-laden productions and larger-than-life formats such as CinemaScope, VistaVision, Cinerama, and 3-D. Drastic changes in technology of movies and televison which were the beginnings of the movies we have today were all brought about by the decline of movie goers, due to television becoming more popular. This also had an affect towards theater which had to compete vs the changing technology of film and televison. Feb 8th, 1950 Modern Credit Card Introduced The modern credit card was the successor of a variety of merchant credit schemes. It was first used in the 1940s, in the United States, specifically to sell fuel to a growing number of automobile owners. In 1938 several companies started to accept each other's cards.

The concept of customers paying different merchants using the same card was expanded in 1950 by Ralph Schneider and Frank McNamara, founders of Diners Club, to consolidate multiple cards. Jan 1st, 1951 Super glue invented. Super Glue, also known as cyanoacrylate, was originally discovered in 1942 by Dr. Harry Coover. Nine years later, in 1951, now working at Eastman Kodak, Dr. Coover was the supervisor of a project looking at developing a heat resistant acrylate polymer for jet canopies. Fred Joyner was working on that project and at one point used the rediscovered Super Glue and tested it by spreading ethyl cyanoacrylate between a pair of refractometer prisms. Jan 1st, 1952 Charles Ginsburg invented the first video tape recorder (VTR). The VTR is said to have revolutionized television broadcasting. Tape recording of television signals dates to just after World War II, when audio tape recorders were used to record the very high frequency signals needed for television. Aug 13th, 1952 Edward Teller and team build the hydrogen bomb.

A thermonuclear weapon is a nuclear weapon design that uses the heat generated by a fission bomb to compress and ignite a nuclear fusion stage. This results in a greatly increased explosive power. It is colloquially referred to as a hydrogen bomb or H-bomb because it employs hydrogen fusion, though in most applications the majority of its destructive energy comes from uranium fission, not hydrogen fusion alone. Oct 1st, 1952 Tetracycline invented. Tetracycline is a broad-spectrum polyketide antibiotic produced by the Streptomyces genus of Actinobacteria, indicated for use against many bacterial infections. It is a protein synthesis inhibitor. It is commonly used to treat acne today, and, more recently, rosacea, and is historically important in reducing the number of deaths from cholera. Oct 7th, 1952 The first patent for bar code issued to inventors Joseph Woodland and Bernard Silver. Woodland and Silver filed a patent application for "Classifying Apparatus and Method", in which they described both the linear and bullseye printing patterns, as well as the mechanical and electronic systems needed to read the code.

Jan 1st, 1953 David Warren invented the black box - flight recorder. Popularly referred to as a "black box" by the media, the data recorded by the FDR is used for accident investigation, as well as for analyzing air safety issues, material degradation and engine performance. Due to their importance in investigating accidents, these ICAO-regulated devices are carefully engineered and stoutly constructed to withstand the force of a high speed impact and the heat of an intense fire. Jan 1st, 1953 The first musical synthesizer invented by RCA. A sound synthesizer is an electronic instrument capable of producing a wide range of sounds. Synthesizers may either imitate other instruments or generate new timbres. Apr 1st, 1953 DNA Discovered Taken in 1952, this image is the first X-ray picture of DNA, which led to the discovery of its molecular structure by Watson and Crick. Created by Rosalind Franklin using a technique called X-ray crystallography, it revealed the helical shape of the DNA molecule. Watson and Crick realized that DNA was made up of two chains of nucleotide pairs that encode the genetic information for all living things.

Sep 10th, 1953 Transistor radio invented by Texas Instruments. A transistor radio is a small portable radio receiver that uses transistor-based circuitry. Following their development in 1954 they became the most popular electronic communication device in history, with billions manufactured during the 1960s and 1970s. Their pocket size sparked a change in popular music listening habits, allowing people to listen to music anywhere they went. Dec 17th, 1953 Color TV Invented A successful color television system began commercial broadcasting, first authorized by the FCC on December 17, 1953 based on a system designed by RCA. "Between 1946 and 1950 the research staff of RCA Laboratories invented the world's first electronic, monochrome compatible, color television system." Jan 1st, 1954 Oral contraceptives invented - the pill. Pincus knows progesterone will work, but in order to get FDA approval he will need to test the drug on humans, which only a clinical doctor can do. Finally with adequate funding at hand, Pincus joins forces with Dr.

John Rock to test the drug on Rock's female patients. In Massachusetts, a state with extremely restrictive anti-birth control laws, Rock and Pincus begin the first human trials with 50 women, under the guise of a fertility study. Searle provides the pills for the trial. Jan 21st, 1954 First Atomic Submarin lauched USS Nautilus (SSN-571) is the world's first operational nuclear-powered submarine. She was the first vessel to complete a submerged transit to the North Pole on 3 August 1958. Sharing names with the submarine in Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, and named after another USS Nautilus (SS-168) that served with distinction in World War II, Nautilus was authorized in 1951 and launched in 1954. Oct 4th, 1954 The solar cell invented by Chaplin, Fuller and Pearson. Three American researchers, Gerald Pearson, Calvin Fuller and Daryl Chapin, designed a silicon solar cell capable of a six percent energy conversion efficiency with direct sunlight.

Jan 1st, 1956 Bette Nesmith Graham invented "Mistake Out," to paint over mistakes made with a typewriter. Bette Nesmith Graham never intended to be an inventor; she wanted to be an artist. However, shortly after World War II ended, she found herself divorced with a small child to support. She learned shorthand and typing and found employment as an executive secretary. An efficient employee who took pride in her work, Graham sought a better way to correct typing errors. She remembered that artists painted over their mistakes on canvas, so why couldn’t typists paint over their mistakes? Jan 1st, 1956 Computers becoming more complex and more compact. Starting in 1956, computers continue to increase in complexity, usablitiy, and become smaller. Many inventions such as the modem, the microchip, computer language, circuit boards, and hard disks for data were invented in the mid to late 50's and early 60's. Jun 1st, 1956 T.V. Remote Control Invented The first remote intended to control a television was developed by Zenith Radio Corporation in 1950.

The remote, called "Lazy Bones", was connected to the television by a wire. A wireless remote control, the "Flashmatic", was developed in 1955 by Eugene Polley. It worked by shining a beam of light onto a photoelectric cell, but the cell did not distinguish between light from the remote and light from other sources. In 1956, Robert Adler developed "Zenith Space Command", a wireless remote. Sep 10th, 1956 The hovercraft invented by Christopher Cockerell. Christopher Cockerell's idea was to build a vehicle that would move over the water's surface, floating on a layer of air. This would reduce friction between the water and vehicle. To test his hypothesis, he put one a smaller can inside a larger can and used a hairdryer to blow air into them. May 16th, 1960 Lasers Invented In 1960, Theodore Maiman invented the ruby laser considered to be the first successful optical or light laser. Sep 10th, 1960 The halogen lamp invented. It is an advanced form of incandescent lamp.

The filament is composed of ductile tungsten and located in a gas filled bulb just like a standard tungsten bulb, however the gas in a halogen bulb is at a higher pressure (7-8 ATM). The glass bulb is made of fused quartz, high-silica glass or aluminosilicate. This bulb is stronger than standard glass in order to contain the high pressure. This lamp has been an industry standard for work lights and film/television/theater lighting. Period:

Question: Invented by Dr David Warren in the 1950’s, what is the ‘Flight Data Recorder’ better known as?
Answer: The ‘Black Box’